


Emergence

by Howlfang



Category: Escape the Night (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Death, Escape the Night Season 3, Gen, Help, I'm Bad At Summaries, I'm Bad At Tagging, Magical Artifacts, My First AO3 Post, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV Multiple, Resurrection, Slow Build, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-26
Updated: 2019-08-17
Packaged: 2020-07-20 00:28:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19983046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Howlfang/pseuds/Howlfang
Summary: Collecting artifacts, with the price of one person dying. Everyone has gotten used to this, but that still doesn't freak them out every time.A strange, new artifact has arrived to the town of Everlock, can Joey and his friends escape the night?





	1. Revival -Matpat-

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first story on this website and so I'm new at this whole story posting thing. I hope you, y'know, enjoy this story.  
> I do have to apologize about the layout, because I don't know if it looks weird or not, since I'm on my phone.

Pain. That’s all I feel.

_Find the Lazarus Coin!_

Just floating on a sea of nothingness.

My last words to my friends is echoing.

_Find it!_

Over and over.

_-Coin!_

I hope Ro manages to survive, as well as anyone else.

A bright light appears before me, and colors starts to leak into this dark world.

I immediately stumble to the floor, since when I was standing? I grabbed onto a surface that’s above me, my sight slowly returning as well as the rest of my senses. My limbs, heavy to move properly. I vaguely make out that the surface I grabbed onto is a table as I lifted myself from the floor. There’s a lot of sounds, almost overwhelming. I then realized that the room I'm in, no matter how blurry, is the arcade. I managed to stand, still holding onto the table, as I look at myself, in my 1970's detective outfit. Strange, didn't I die in gym clothes by the Strongman?

“You said he was an insurance salesman?” Is that Safiya? “I don’t trust insurance salesman…” Rosanna! I’m so glad they’re alive! I started walking towards the lounge as I can hear Joey mumbling something. “Oh my god!” I hear someone saying, Manny I think. Everyone gently lead me over to one of the couches. Safiya laughs happily, exclaiming that it worked as she hugs Joey. I noticed that Rosanna is sitting right next to me and I moved to embrace her as Manny declare, “Mat, we are so happy to see you. Oh, hi!” I get up and hug Manny as Nikita has one of her arms out for a hug. I quickly let go of Manny and gently squeeze her before moving to Joey and finally, Safiya. I relax back down onto the couch as a harp catches my eye. I could only assume that’s what was in the Lazarus Box “Mat, we were able to bring one person back, and we chose you” “And we brought you back.” Safiya and Joey almost talk over each other. I couldn’t believe that they picked me to come back, that means so much to me. “You chose me?”

“What happened since you died?” Joey then quiz me, a question I knew I would’ve been asked, since I just came back from the dead. I take a deep breath and answer, “I saw a church and- and standing in front of it was a blonde woman and an Asian man.” “The Society Against Evil.” He announces, letting all of us know as he stares at me. “They said that one of us had been to that place.” I confirm his story, taking his side. "Joey, you were right." I have no doubt that Joey’s an irreplaceable piece in this mission. Nikita informs me about this puzzle from the briefcase that has drawings with a note that reads, ‘Tell my story to let the fun begin.’

After a few minutes of analyzing the drawings, Rosanna then figured out that each one appears to be different phases of someone’s life, whomever signed every paper with the letter, ‘W’, which must stand for Willy, according to Mortimer. Once all of the drawings are in order and we’ve solved the puzzle, a box unlocks. Manny opens the box fully and removes a red push-button from it. “Should I push it?” Manny asks all of us as we crowd around Manny, still giving him lots of room, which Rosanna then speak up. “Are you gonna push it?” “The artifact?” “Yeah, I’m ready.”

“We need to press it.” Joey starts saying as Manny add. “Team vote, yes?” Everyone else agrees, and Nikita declares. “We don’t have time-” The lights go out unexpectedly as we all scream.


	2. Welcome to the Funhouse

The room is pitch black. So dark you can't even make out any sort of shape. “It’s so dark.” Rosanna says as a beam of light comes on, emitting from the flashlight that someone has found from a chest that has opened. “You know what?” I start. “We hadn’t even look at the map yet.” Everyone else seems to realize as well and we take the map off the wall, shining it with the flashlight. “So the newest thing here is the funhouse. It says ‘ _ The funhouse is open for business. Bloody business. _ ’” We then figured out that the flashlight acts like a blacklight, as words appears on the wall that was definitely not there before. We look around the room, an arrow on the walls, traveling all around the room with words that spells out, ‘follow grave instructions literally’ and a sequence of numbers at the end of the line. “Okay, where’s a grave?” Manny quizzes, as Mat add. “Where have we seen a grave?”

Joey points out a poster that shows a graveyard with one of the tombstones says 'R.I.P'. "So what do we do now?" I ask Joey, who plainly responds. "Rip it." "Wait, where?" Mat asks. "Just-" Joey cuts himself off as he starts to tear the poster off the wall, revealing a combination lock and the lights turn itself back on. I then input the combination and open the safe, exposing the artifact with a note in front of it. I read the note. “It says, ‘The Psychedelic Swirl warps and distorts the souls of those who stare into it. To cleanse this wicked artifact, you must brave the rooms of the funhouse.” I take a breath before continuing, everyone’s somewhat crowding around me. “You’ll need a ticket to enter, but don’t plan on making it back out.’” “Oh, there’s tickets next to the artifact!” Rosanna points out and we take the tickets and the artifact out of the safe and place them on the coffee table. From we can tell, there's plenty of tickets for all of us.

"Of fucking course there's enough tickets for all of us!" Nikita yells, frustrated as Joey counts the tickets and goes. "There's only enough for six people." "We are not liable for death?" Mat read the writing on one of the tickets as Rosanna repeats the last three words. We apprehensively leave the arcade and go to this funhouse, which prompt Manny to go. “This is the creepiest funhouse I’ve ever seen, like, ever.”

A man, -strangely with a large hollow, head with four faces?- comes out of the funhouse. “Guys, I think that’s him.” I whisper to the group, who nod in agreement. "A few rules before you suffer" He snarls at us before turning his ‘head’ around before continuing happily and seeming professional. “At the end of the hallway is an elevator. You want to enter in at one time or-” Willy switches personalities and threatens. “I’ll rip your guts out with a fishhook.” Once again, he changes. “The elevator will spew you into a room, which you must solve quickly.” I move my feet nervously as Manny yells. “Bitch, choose one and stick to it.” The madman seems to ignore him as he proceeds with his instructions, randomly altering whatever personality he’s on to any of the other three.

Mat first enters the Funhouse, and can barely hear his shouts to stop over whatever machinery this building uses. A few minutes later, Willy then gestures me to enter. I anxiously enter the hallway and the so-called elevator and spun around several times before getting off into a room that looks like it's made out of candy. "Oh hey Saf!" Mat says, popping balloons with a needle. I look at him, confused as he speaks again. "Trying to get candy out of these balloons for Willy's candy row." "Uh… okay?" I slowly reply, grabbing a needle and starts helping him popping. Some candy falls out of some of the balloons and we scoop them up and place them on a table near the candy organizer.

A minute or two later, Rosanna stumbles in, slightly dizzy. Mat catches her gently and brings her up to speed of why we're popping balloons. She then starts popping them, or at least trying to. "You're doing great!" I cheer her on, still ripping through the balloons. Eventually all of them are just deflated pieces of rubber on the floor -we even found a World Encyclopedia in the middle of all this- and we begin to put the candy in order, from hard to chewy. "Well, someone has a pretty big sweet tooth." I mumbled, making the petite girl laugh as Mat seems to be really focused on solving this puzzle. We solved it, as Rosanna points out which one would go in order as Mat and I place them. “Here’s a clue.” I state as I pick up a note from a chest that open and read it. “ _ ‘Carnival Master corrupted one of you. _ ’” We look at each other, confused as we get different colored-candy cardboard pieces and a key.

Willy then stroll in the room as we hide behind pillars. Mat seems to be zoning out or something, as Willy grabs him and yank him out from his spot. Mat blinks confused and then starts struggling as he realizes who's dragging him out of the room. "No!" He shouts and is being forced to leave the room. We search around the room, looking for where the key goes into as I can hear Mat faintly yelling. “Mat!” Rosanna says as I raise my voice for him to hear me. “Mat, we’re gonna come save you, okay?”

The red light goes off as we attempt to solve this swirled-candy puzzle in the cupboard. I quickly put whatever I'm holding in my hands down and runs into the elevator, grabbing the World Encyclopedia and hopping in. The elevator spins and dispenses me into a room that is sideways, Joey and Manny are in here. They see that I have a book and I hand it over to solve whatever puzzle they’re on. After some time since I’ve arrived, the lights turn red and Joey runs out of the room, going who knows where. Manny and I are trying to figure out this combination puzzle, and we’re looking through the window of this sideways room for any stars. Nothing at all. The lights go off again and despite Manny being in this room before me, I hop into the elevator which then takes me to the lava room. I instantly notice this constellation on the far wall, and it made me think about the puzzle Manny is stuck on. I start to hear Manny again as I bounce over to a platform as Joey jump back to the platform he was just standing on. “Ro. Ro, Ro!” Manny speaks from the sideways as I join Rosanna on the center platform. “Yeah?” Rosanna replies, looking a bit confused but raring to go. “Okay, there’s constellations on the wall.” Manny state. “I need you guys to give me that code.”

“W-wait, Manny!” Joey says, looking at a peephole in the wall. Nice to find out how Manny knew who’s in the room. “Look in he- hi!” “Hi, honey,” Manny’s voice slightly echoing, probably by the peephole despite the room he’s in is right next to ours. “I’ve been calling to you this whole time! You’ve been busy!” Rosanna and I wait for the signal to give him the combination. Rosanna counts the first constellation. “The first one is five.” “Six, actually.” I correct her and she giggles. She then gives the rest of the combination to Manny, who presumably solves the safe.

Joey just got caught by Willy as I hop around on the platforms in the lava room with Rosanna. We stand on the center platform when Manny enters the room, carrying money. I start to give orders of what lights we hit then all the sudden, Willy comes back for round two and catches Manny. We play Simon Says as we also play The Floor is Lava. I push the last light, then Willy's voice congrats us. “I gave it a zero stars on Yelp.” Rosanna mutter as we leave the funhouse and come across a glass box with a note and two lightbulbs inside. “ _ ‘Lucky you, take your prize. Now get back to the lounge and decide who among you cap-' _ " I stop before rereading the note again. “ _ 'Who among your captured friends will undertake my final challenge.' _ " "What?” I hear her say as I finish reading. “ _ 'Choose wisely. You never know what can happen in my house.' _ ” We then see our friends in this jail and sprint up to it. I tell them that we have to pick two of them, much to no one’s surprise. We start to walk towards the lounge, with Nikita yelling after us. “Don’t pick me, bitches!”

"So we have to pick two people." I murmur to Rosanna once we get back to the lounge, Mortimer strangely missing while Calliope paces before stopping, seeing us and walks over to the bar. "Yeah…" Rosanna bites her lip. "We just got Mat back and I think it's unfair to send him to his death." I nod before adding. "Joey seems to be very important in all of this." I gesture vaguely and she understands. "Whatever the hell this is, really. So I guess we're voting Manny and Nikita?" I ask and look at the petite girl, who suddenly looks distraught. "I really don't want to vote… but I'll pick Manny? No, Nikita?" She second guesses herself. I cover her hands gently and clarify as calmly as I can be. "I'll vote Nikita and you can vote for Manny. Okay?" My voice wavers near the end, displaying my fears and uneasiness for the ones we're picking to fight against. We tell Calliope to pick cards for Nikita and Manny, and she accepts with a bow of her head and slips the two cards into this voting box.

Not too long afterward, Mat and Joey enters the room and Rosanna jumps from the couch and hugs Mat. I smile at the sight as Joey sits down next to me. Mat release the hug and they sit down as well, Rosanna is still crying from earlier but not as much now. "Guess we have to play the waiting game." Mat speaks up, looking somewhat uneasy. "Is there even any sort of games?" Joey asks Calliope who shrugs and sadly shakes her head. I decided to launch a game of I Spy, which then didn't last long since we're all very on edge. Rosanna changes spots to talk to Joey and I join in the conversation a little bit as well as Mat. We decide to talk about whatever

We’re nervously waiting for whoever walks through that fridge door. Ro is fiddling with her coat pompoms as we talk about what would the next artifact would be. Willy just strutted into the lounge, presenting his fishhook and chaos broke out. All of us splitting up into different corners as we start yelling at Willy about him being here, in the one room of this entire town that we all thought was safe. If he can easily walk into this room, then what's the point of hiding in here?! Willy briefly looks at everyone -although he lingered at Mat a bit longer for some reason- before landing his gaze on me.

The four-face madman starts walking towards me, everyone's voices are all mixing together, more or less saying the exact same thing. I see Mat moving towards Willy, as if he's going to try and stop him. He lifts his hook, ready to hit me when Mat tackles him as best as he can, causing the weapon to change course. So much pain has just started rocketing the second Willy swung his hook straight into me, I instantly collapsed. I can barely see, or hear, as the pain consumes me, unable to process beyond it.


	3. The Next Artifact -Rosanna-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updating a new chapter to let anyone know that yes, this story will be different from canon, despite some things will be similar and by updating within not even 10 hours, there will be no chapters for a while  
> Hope you enjoy

I started sobbing, covering my mouth as we all witnessed Safiya gets stabbed in the leg by Willy's giant hook. Mat has saved her, but then Willy seems to think that wasn't enough and starts to swing it again. Mat steps in between Safiya and the Funhouse owner, grabbing the weapon and struggles against Willy. Manny and Nikita has arrived. One of them -not entirely sure who since so much is happening- rushes over and screw in the final lightbulb into the artifact, cleansing it as well as making Willy disappear in a decaying state of dust. 

As the last bit of Willy crumbles away, we all check on Safiya since she did just get attacked by him. "Are you okay?" I ask the ebony-colored hair woman, Mat -along with Joey- gently lifting and carrying her over to a couch in the center of the room, putting her in a half-lying, half-sitting position. "Honestly…" Safiya scoffs, "It hurts a lot, and I don't think I'll be able to run, much less walk at all!" I see Mat walking over to Nikita, mumbling at her and I reply. "Well, maybe you can stay here with one of us as we run around, cleansing each artifact?" I start to fiddle with the pompoms of my coat as I wait for Safiya to answer, taking in the scene around us.

Calliope is talking to Mortimer near the bar. Manny is standing right next to Nikita, Joey seems to have joined the conversation with Mat and Nikita, who are all standing a bit far away from us and is nearly at the entrance of the lounge. "I could do that but then I would feel like I'm not helping as much as I should be doing." Safiya sighs a bit, leaning against me a little bit, her head nearly resting on my shoulder. I open my mouth to assure her, when Mat suddenly yells. "SHUT UP!" Nikita starts to retort when Joey puts himself between the two. "NO! You don't even care that Safiya almost died!" Mat bellow and pushes the blond-haired man out of his way, finger pointing accusingly at Nikita, who is completely stone-faced. "I thought I was going to lose my best friend, you don't know what that feels like!" Nikita shrieks back as Joey manages to stop the argument right there and Mat then stomps over to the back wall, not even looking at us as he sat down in one of the chairs in the corner. "Mat…" I start to speak, keeping my voice low, as I turn to face him after a few minutes of hushed voices from the Mean Girls squad, and Joey, Calliope and Mortimer. He looks away from glaring at Nikita and faces me, eyes still harboring the anger but seems to be letting go of his grudge.

"Okay!" Joey says, clapping his hands to get our attention. "So we have to find the next artifact pretty soon. Despite the tension between us, we'll have to work together." Everyone’s a bit slow to agree and Mat speaks up, looking at him. “He’s right, we need to cleanse the last two artifacts if we want to survive.” I stand up, starting to look for any clues as everyone gets up and begins searching. I briefly pursuit through the cupboards of the bar; empty, some drinks that I think came from Fatman Slim’s, papers, a fake skull, and a book. I move to a different part of the room before someone shouts in excitement.

Safiya has taken the map down and place it over the table, instantly sitting down and starts to read the new text that has been revealed along with three brand new locations. The gas station, the cemetery and the church. We decide to go to the gas station first, since it's the closest to us. I wave bye to Safiya as we leave the room and shut the fridge door behind us.

"Oh my God!" Joey says as we see someone tied up to a large wooden beam and has a bunch of sticks around his feet. Mortimer starts running over as we quickly follow after. We realize that there's a puzzle to be solved and we have to free this poor man before the witches come back? Why are we dealing with witches right now?! Mat, Mortimer and Calliope hang around the car, telling us what numbers to use. I look over there as I'm attempting to solve this puzzle. Mat and Calliope seems to be talking about something as Mortimer walks towards me and asks. "Do you need help?" Uh…" I turn my head back to the puzzle and reply. "I think I got it. Thanks anyway!" Mortimer nods, acknowledging as he went to Manny or Nikita. I manage to solve this puzzle and as soon as I took the stickman artifact out of the safe, something sprayed at me and I yelp, jumping back and waving my hands quickly to disperse the fog.

Mat, Joey and Manny untie the hooded man from the stake and he takes it off, revealing his pig snout and piggish features. We recoil a bit, not really expecting that. Three ladies in fancy, somewhat not age-appropriate dresses with each having different types of horns protruding from their heads show up, and we scream in panic as we all run towards Fatman Slim’s and Mat locks the door once everyone friendly got inside. Some of us sit down, either on tables or seats. An old lady comes out of hiding wherever she was in. She introduces herself, -Maria- and explains her situation. We find out that we need to do three challenges and out of the blue, Mat says. "Seriously? We have to go through more hurdles to cleanse this artifact? Haven't we done enough?" I look over at him. He's sitting in a different booth, looking very moody. I slip into his booth while everyone's discussing about who's in what group and holds his hand. Mat looks up, looking somewhat on edge and nervous. He turns his head away as Joey announces the two groups. We then get into our groups to reverse one of three courses, or at least locate and get the items. The two groups are Mat, Manny and Mortimer while I'm with Joey, Nikita and Calliope. Pig-snout man, -Nolan- and Maria are going to stay in the restaurant.

Me, Joey, Nikita and Calliope walks over to the bridge just before the church and cemetery. Nikita and I start to chant a spell onto Joey, to make him resistant to the witches, so he doesn't fall under their spell? We then slowly creep up to the church and lookie, a witch just standing around in the cemetery. Joey takes a deep breath and struts towards her. The witch attempts to lure him away but he manages to make sure that she doesn't see us. I couldn't hear much between the two but Joey's saying something about bones and wildly gestures at us at a tombstone whenever the witch isn't looking. We sneak up to the grave as quietly as possible and revives Maria’s brother, Sam, who is half naked. I look away, feeling a smidge uncomfortable as Nikita somewhat awe over him. After some convincing, Sam hands over his wedding ring and runs off before getting caught. The witch catches us and Joey gets cursed as we dash away swiftly.

Mortime and Manny are sitting in the stools when we enter Fatman Slim’s. Mat, Maria, and Nolan seems to be absent. “What’s up?” Manny says, relaxing a bit. “We reversed the curse on Pig Face and he just left.” Nikita sits down next to Manny as Joey asks, placing Maria’s brother’s wedding ring on the table booth. “Okay but where’s Mat and Maria?” Manny and Mortimer looks at each other. “Well?” I then challenge, waiting for one of them to answer, putting my fists on my hips and trying to look intimidating. “He said he’s gonna check on Saf.” Manny explains. “He was worried about her.” “We’re all-” Joey cuts himself off and rephases. “Most of us are worried about Safiya. We can check up on her once we get and return Maria to her young age.”

“We need to find Maria.” I tell everyone. “It’s a bit strange that we didn’t see her on the way here. Do you guys know where she went?” Manny makes a ‘I dunno’ face and shrugs as Mortimer says. “Hadn’t seen her since we left to get our stuff.” Nikita stands up, speaking. “I say we go find her, see if she hadn’t got into trouble and who fucking knows, we’ll find Mat along the way.” We all nod in agreement and we leave the bar, trying to find Maria and Mat.


	4. The Witches' Challenge -Manny-

We walk around Everlock, sticking to the walls of the buildings so those witch bitches doesn’t see us that easily. Joey peeks around the corner and turns back to us. “I found Maria.” He whispers. “Then why are you-” I start to speak but Joey shushes me. I look at him, feeling insulted but obliges. “Then why are we whispering?” I then ask, keeping my voice low. “There’s the witches surrounding her.” Oh, that’s why. “Wait, who’s cursed?” I question the group, just realizing that some of us got cursed by the witches. Ro, Joey and I raise their hands, almost in sync. “Shit.” I hear Nikita muttering under her breath. “So who wants to go save Maria?” Joey nervously ask, looking at us. “I could ask you, Ro, to get out there but I have no idea if they’ll let you near them.” “I can do it” The petite girl says, jumping up and down, raring to go. She walks towards the witches and Maria, before any of us could bring her back into hiding. “Hey ladies!” I hear Rosanna chirp. “I… uh, I just need to bring her with me.” “Would you like to trade places with her?” The witch holding Maria ask, moving her dagger from Maria’s throat and points it at Rosanna. “O-oh, um… Maybe later, yeah?” Rosanna nervously speaks, managing to pull Maria away and start to run towards us. We all make a break for it, as a witch manages to curse one of us, Nikita, I think.

We dash inside of Fatman Slim’s and wouldn’t you know it? Mat is there, sitting in a booth. He immediately stands up and hugs the Jetsetter, asking. “What happened since I went to check on Saf?” “You weren’t here, bitch.” Nikita bluntly states, some anger in her words. “So…” Joey says, attempting to defuse the situation. “Ro, Manny, Nikita and I got cursed.” “That means we have to take the final challenge, Mat.” Rosanna add. Mat’s face is hard to read, being very emotionless before he starts grimacing, speaking. “Well, good luck guys.” He shakes Rosanna’s, Joey’s, and my hand, completely ignoring Nikita. “I’ll be here, waiting this time.” Mat says, sitting back down. Nikita struts out of the building and I follow her, Rosanna and Joey waving bye. I overhear Mat going. “Just know I love you, Ro.” “I love you, Mat.” She replies as she steps outside.

We slowly make our way to the final challenge, with Calliope in the lead. Those three witches are waiting for us, glaring at us. They explain the rules of this race. The first part has drinks on a single table, four drinks for each of us. So when you find the pentagram at the bottom of a cup, you can move onwards. The Witches’ Stack, which looks like that game you’d play when you used to be younger. For building or some shit, I dunno. Then it’s bobbing for apples, but rotten apples? I think it’s the same rules as normal, just a name change. The last part is basically avoid the lasers, like those spy movies. If a bell rings, you have to start over.

We all line up and get ready to start. Once we’ve been given the signal, we’re off and starts chugging the drinks to find the symbol. Joey has found his and moves quickly to the next part. Nikita and Rosanna aren’t reacting well with how freaking carbonated and nasty tasting these drinks are. I see mine at the second cup and runs ahead. Joey seems to be stuck but still attempting to solve it. I relocate each ring, although it’ll take me a while. “Yes!” I hear Joey cheer as he advances and out of the corner of my eye, I see Rosanna half-running, half-stumbling to her table. She doesn’t look too well from the drinks. I manage to finish my stack and speed ahead and kneel down to stick my head into the murky water. I have to come back up for air, barely worrying about my makeup at the moment. I feel very stressed as I dive my head back into the water. Eventually I feel an apple against my face, bite into it after a few attempts and bring it out. Ditching the apple as I proceed, Joey just finished, Nikita seems to finally move to the Witches’ Stack and Rosanna’s bobbing for apples.

“Oh god…” I mumble, as I begin to slowly climb through this string labyrinth. With every step I take, I wobble as I almost lose my balance. At one point, I almost set a bell off but it goes off, hearing a “Darn it!” and I assume that was Ro’s bell. I slowly continue and reach the finish line. I smile excitedly and high-five Joey, happy to have finally complete the race. The feeling didn’t last long as I turn to see Nikita having trouble with her basket of apples. Rosanna moves very slow as she goes through the Witches’ Sieve. She accidentally moves a string, which sets off a bell and she huffs, going back to restart. Nikita has found her apple and catches up to Rosanna as she’s halfway through the final part. I held my breath as I grab onto Joey’s arm, tension rising. Nikita is slowly making her way as Rosanna crosses the finish line. Nikita seems to realize what has happened and climbs out, not caring if she keep ringing each and every bell on the strings.

“I love you, you know that Nikita?” I sadly say, tears threatening to ruin whatever’s left of my makeup. “I know that, Manny…” The Troublemaker declare, looking very tough but her voice’s betraying her as it wavers. The witches surrounds her as Joey grabs the Amulet of Youth. Nikita struggles, not going down without a fight as she forcefully follows them to this altar. We start to walk away, heading back to Fatman Slim’s as we wince, hearing Nikita’s blood-curdling screams as they sacrifice her before it fades away. I lost my best friend in the whole world, I feel so, so much grief as I side hug Joey and Rosanna. The world seem to freeze, but we’re all living.

I don’t think I have any more tears left to shed as we get back to the bar, Mat, Mortimer and Maria are still there. “Guys?” Mat asks, looking confused before working out the context clues. “Oh… I’m sorry, Manny.” Mat hugs me, and everyone else joins in. We eventually separate and Joey reveals the amulet to Maria, which starts to glow and magically makes her young again. She’s very overjoyed of being young once again and someone enters the bar, he’s kinda cute looking. “Sam?” Maria asks. Ohh, that’s her formally dead brother. “Maria!” Sam says, hugging her. They leave the bar and we follow them to watch them leave the town, reminding all of us that there is a reason that the town needs rescuing besides defeating the big bad Carnival Master.

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know if there's any mistakes that I may have missed! Like, any grammar errors and stuff!


End file.
